DCE Blows GH¢70,000 On Fuel

Julius Debrah, Minister of Local Government and Rural Development 

Some elected assembly members of the Shama District Assembly in the Western Region have accused the District Chief Executive (DCE), Enoch Kojo Appiah, of reckless spending of the assembly's resources.

According to them, because of the DCE's alleged corrupt practices the district had been retrogressing in terms of both qualitative and quantitative development for the past three and half years.

The assembly members claimed that the DCE had used a whopping GH¢70,000 on fuel for the assembly's grader in constructing a playing field for Shama Senior High School.

'Unfortunately this huge amount of money could not help complete the work and so a rural bank operating in the area had to give some money for the purchase of fuel to complete the project,' the assembly members asserted.

This was contained in a petition signed by the Shama Constituency Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) who is also the assembly member for Shama Electoral Area, Joseph Mensah-Eshun, and eight other assembly members in the district.

DAILY GUIDE yesterday intercepted a copy of the petition which was sent to the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development.

The eight other assembly members who signed the petition included Joseph Isaiah Mensah of Etifi Electoral Area; Francis Biney, Lower Inchaban; Mark Arthur, Essaman and Christian Ampah, Obinimokyena.

The rest were Famous Hotowor, Anto-Aboase Electoral Area; Samuel Garera, Apo Shama; Vincent Gafa, Beposo and Yahaya Husseinu, Upper Inchaban Electoral Area.

According to the statement, the DCE had failed woefully to mobilise resources for the overall development of the district despite the economic and financial opportunities in the area.

'The district has over ten quarry companies which can be levied to raise money for development of the district, instead the DCE secretly collects monies and quarry chippings for his personal gains,' the statement alleged.

The assembly members also noted that DCE Enoch Appiah had been influencing the award of new contracts and collecting 10 percent kickbacks even though the general assembly had resolved not to award new contracts until the completion of old ones.

'What annoys us is that the DCE brings his own contractors and influences the tender committee to approve the contractors' bid without necessarily checking the financial capabilities of executing the projects,' the assembly members stated in the petition.

The assembly members stated that 'the DCE also collected an amount of GH¢8,500 and GH¢2,000 from the assembly for his Masters and top-up programmes respectively at the University of Cape Coast.'

'The most disgraceful aspect of all these is that DCE Enoch Appiah collected 75 bags of cement in the name of the assembly for a proposed school project at Aboadze Islamic School in the district, but the DCE has failed to pay for the cement,' the statement added.

'We had wanted to pass a vote of no confidence in the DCE but we think that it will be a disgrace to the president and disrespect to the minister of local government,' the assembly members stressed.

The assembly members have therefore called on the president to dismiss DCE Enoch Appiah as soon as possible, adding, 'the DCE is a disgrace to the district.'

The DCE could not be reached for his side of the story because his phone was off.

DAILY GUIDE gathered that he was addressing an oil and gas forum when the paper wanted to reach him.

Attempts to reach the Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Julius Debrah, were also not successful.

From Emmanuel Opoku, Takoradi